Education

When Terry Walls of Springfield, Mo., decided to go back to college at age 52, he wanted to put to rest a family rumor. He had heard his mother was denied admission to Missouri State University, and he was pointed toward Meyer Library on the MSU campus for answers.

There, he discovered an eloquent letter typed on fragile, onion-skin paper and signed with his mother's maiden name: Mary Jean Price. It was dated Oct. 2, 1950, and it was addressed to the university registrar:

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Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of Health and Human Services, will address students at Georgetown University tomorrow.

As NPR's Barbara Bradley Hagerty reports, that's created one of several controversies this season over commencement speakers.

BARBARA BRADLEY HAGERTY, BYLINE: Sebelius is Catholic. She's also liberal and pro-choice. And the fact that she's speaking to Georgetown's Public Policy Institute makes conservative Catholics, like Patrick Reilly, see red.

PATRICK REILLY: Well, this is clearly a betrayal of the bishops.

A year after a devastating tornado ripped through Joplin, Missouri, President Obama is set to go back and deliver Joplin High School's commencement speech. Host Michel Martin speaks with Joplin High Principal Kerry Sachetta for an update on how the school and the town are recovering.

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This is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Melissa Block.

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And I'm Robert Siegel.

Those who want to raise standards on student achievement tests have suffered an embarrassing setback in Florida. The state made its writing exam harder and results plummeted. So the state is backtracking. It's now lowering its passing score and admitting something went wrong.

Sarah Gonzalez of member station WLRN has that story.

SARAH GONZALEZ, BYLINE: About a dozen Florida school superintendents were at a conference in Orlando this week when the results of the state's new writing scores came in. The mood...

With the economic troubles of the past few years, it's no surprise that the number of people using food stamps is soaring. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that an average of 44 million people were on food assistance last year; that's up from 17 million in 2000.

What might be surprising, though, is one subgroup that's taken a particularly hard hit.

The number of people with graduate degrees — master's degrees and doctorates — who have had to apply for food stamps, unemployment or other assistance more than tripled between 2007 and 2010, according to a report in The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Middle age is prime time for saving money. From your late 40s through early 60s, you're supposed to squirrel away cash to cope with health care costs in your old age.

But for millions of Americans, middle age also is the time when children are seeking help with higher-education bills, and elderly parents may be needing assistance with daily care.

Scott and Kelley Hawkins, both 46, are in that middle position. As they brace for paying rising college expenses for two daughters in school at once, they know they will have many tough financial decisions to make. "A lot of extra stuff we used to have money for, we don't have the money for" now that the hefty-tuition years are looming, Scott Hawkins said.